SUMMER 2022

Company: Electrolux

Location: Stockholm

Hi! This is our experience from the summer.

We, Albin Boman and Filip Lindblom have this summer been enrolled in a summer internship at Electrolux Group Patents. Electrolux is a global organization that works with patents covering seven different product categories. The highly competitive market and rapidly growing emerging markets provide a scene full of IP-related challenges. We were tasked with evaluating and creating two tools for Electrolux that could be used by their patent engineers and attorneys in their day-to-day work.

The first task revolved around patent portfolio evaluation. Combining traditional quantitative patent portfolio data with market insight a relationship between protection and sales can be created. This relationship is called Exposure. Exposure enables companies to focus their patenting efforts where they really matter. Our tool enables Electrolux to view their current patents and sales for all possible market selections. In total, we included around 9 million data points into the evaluation tool.

The second task was focused on evaluating a single patent, and determining its value for a global producing company such as Electrolux. Through workshops and literature reviews we concluded that a patent can be rated based on three core criteria:

• Detectability of fraudulent use
• Scope of protection
• Strategic fit

In this task we found many challenges relating to how a patent is used in this industry, unlike many other IP fields the home appliance market usually patents only to protect their own inventions, the litigation rate is low and patents are rarely used aggressively. We found that the three criteria above could determine whether a patent is good or bad at protecting the invention, and if the invention is of strategic interest to protect.

Working with an agile methodology with one week sprints guided by two heads of product lines Dr. Christian Mohr and Tore Stjernberg with a dedicated scrum master we saw rapid learning and development of the tools. Due to the scrum setup, our tools could develop from early Miro-sketches into published assets in a matter of weeks.

We really enjoyed the Internship at Electrolux, and we have found ourselves intrigued by the challenges that large producing companies face from a patenting perspective. Don’t be afraid to reach out if you want to know more about the Internship.

Best regards,
Filip & Albin